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Published on 12/07/1998 All articles from this issue

Los Altos out of reach of massive power outage

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By Joanne Griffith Domingue / Town Crier Staff Writer

A massive power outage crippled San Francisco and other areas north of the PG&E substation in San Mateo early in the morning of Dec. 8.

But the folks in Los Altos barely noticed.

City Manager Phil Rose was at a meeting at the Hillview Community Center at 8:15 a.m. that day when the lights went out in San Francisco.

At Hillview, "the lights dimmed, the heating system went off for a moment," and that was all, Rose said.

Over at the police station, "the power blipped, there was a power surge," and that was all, said Capt. Cliff Balch. Not one person called 911.

PG&E confirmed that Los Altos was not affected, "other than a little flicker," said Scott Blakey, spokesman with PG&E.

"The problem was at the San Mateo substation and north of that," Blakey said.

In Los Altos, there was just "an eye wink of a flash, no outages, no surges," Blakey said.

The 375,000 customers who lost power all had it back by evening, Blakey said.